HIV/AIDS Prevention Efforts "Must Include Efforts to Encourage Sexual Abstinence Among Youth," Letter to Editor Says

HIV/AIDS prevention efforts in Washington, D.C., have been "mostly politically driven and not based on sound medical practices," Richard Urban, co-founder and executive director of Urban Life Training and Reality Assessment Teen Choice, writes in a Washington Times letter to the editor in response to a recent Times editorial. According to Urban, any "serious prevention effort must include efforts to encourage sexual abstinence among youth, especially when 42% of high school teens have never had sex." He adds that abstinence is "an excellent AIDS prevention method, but some of those in power in Washington -- who subscribe to the 'religion' that any kind of sexual relationship is OK -- work diligently to block those who promote sexual abstinence and also believe in traditional family values" (Urban, Washington Times, 2/20).

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